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Which is why the skies are so safe. It's not about limiting access. FAA licencing is one of the more liberal aviation regimes across the world.

brudgers 9y ago
FAA regulations make the sky inaccessible to the general citizenry. The safety claim is analogous to a world in which the roads were restricted to commercial vehicles and sports car owners. Safety is primarily achieved by limiting access and hence use.
- closeparen 9y ago
  Flying is available to the general public through the private, recreational, and sport pilot licensing programs. The main barrier to obtaining one of these licenses is the fuel, aircraft rental, and instructor labor costs involved in practicing.
  - brudgers 9y ago
    Access is controlled by limiting the supply of aircraft via regulations, not by limiting the supply of pilot licenses. It was mass production of Model T's not driver licenses that gave citizens freedom. The reason getting a pilot license requires aircraft rental is because access to aircraft is restricted to the point that few people have a family member with an aircraft that can be borrowed.
    - FabHK 9y ago
      Brudgers may be overstating the point, but there are some truths to it: 1. Annual aircraft sales are absolutely tiny. Only about 1000 piston engine airplanes are sold annually globally [1]. 2. Thanks to very small production numbers and demanding certification requirements, almost anything is super expensive in aviation. For example, to add air conditioning to your Diamond DA 40 will cost you 27,500 USD. An aviation headset will cost you 400 to 1000 USD. And so on. So, while I don’t believe that there’s a conspiracy to keep airplane numbers down, the fact remains that very few small aircraft are out there (and outside the USA it looks even grimmer), and only a small fraction of what was produced in the 60s is produced now. [1] https://gama.aero/news-and-events/press-releases/gama-presents-2017-year-end-aircraft-shipment-and-billings-numbers-at-annual-press-conference/ https://gama.aero/news-and-events/press-releases/gama-presen...
      - oldcynic 9y ago
        It's super expensive because the certification is spread across such low numbers. I wouldn't want to reduce certification or remove requirements for dual ignition and suchlike. Sales are tiny because the current fleet is enough, fewer are learning to fly each year, yet it's not much different in real terms today to fly than it was in the 60s. Fewer are walking into a flying club than used to, but many fewer are completing their 40hrs and PPL than used to. Why? That can't be down to sales or parts certification. My guess? Instant gratification combined with no longer being the postwar generation that had a perception of flying as being the arrival of the future. Flying is now a bit "meh" and being stuck in cattle class. Personally I don't understand how a trial lesson isn't enough to hook them for life! Just like back in the 60s it was "the friendly atom", whereas today nuclear power has rather lost its sheen.
      - brudgers 9y ago
        I think the regulations largely stem from domestic security/military policy that views aircraft as potential armaments. Whether that constitutes a conspiracy theory or not is left as an exercise for the reader. [1] What I find interesting about FAA regulations beyond the common idea that their effects are an obvious inevitability is that FAA regulations suggest how a world without the right to repair might look. In particular how the inhibition of the user's right to repair may play out in regard to self driving cars.
- oldcynic 9y ago
  > Safety is primarily achieved by limiting access and hence use. lol. No, safety is achieved by having strong licencing, both for pilots and aircraft, maintenance requirements, such as engine checks every x hours and so forth, and investigation into accidents. Any of the general citizenry can sign up to get a PPL, and in the US it is quite cheap and easy to do so. Long may it remain so. Even so, GA is considered dangerous, and can have impact on your ability to get life insurance. The main cause of GA deaths is pilot error. You can get easier access and lighter touch regulations simply by going for a plane in the light sport category. That has an even poorer safety record than GA.
  - brudgers 9y ago
    The 'light sport' category exactly supports the analogy to sports cars. Two seats and an impractical cargo capacity. The limiting factor for citizen access to the sky is aircraft availability not pilot licensure. A Cessna 172's engine is slightly more sophisticated than an air-cooled VW's but the same basic 1930's technology. A new one starts at $70,000 because there is only a single source. There is only a single source because FAA regulations create a moat. Again, there are only 210,000 non-carrier aircraft in the US, the sky is only accessible to a fraction of the one percent by regulatory intent.
    - freeone3000 9y ago
      $70,000 is also the price of a Lexus or Infiniti or other entry-level luxury car. When you're on the highway surrounded by BMWs and Mercedes E-classes, that's the sort of people who, if flying was something they wanted to do, could have purchased an airplane instead, by your very own metric. In fact, let's extend this a bit further. You say a Cessna is in a moat because it's the only supplier.... of Cessnas. BMW is the only supplier of BMWs! That's ridiculous reasoning. There are other GA and even light sport aircraft available - Piper and FlightDesign and Zenith and Bristell all sell aircraft. And they're all in the same price range, leading one to believe that maybe aircraft manufacture isn't as cheap as you're making it out to be.
      - brudgers 9y ago

brudgers 9y ago

FAA regulations make the sky inaccessible to the general citizenry. The safety claim is analogous to a world in which the roads were restricted to commercial vehicles and sports car owners. Safety is primarily achieved by limiting access and hence use.

closeparen 9y ago
Flying is available to the general public through the private, recreational, and sport pilot licensing programs. The main barrier to obtaining one of these licenses is the fuel, aircraft rental, and instructor labor costs involved in practicing.
- brudgers 9y ago
  Access is controlled by limiting the supply of aircraft via regulations, not by limiting the supply of pilot licenses. It was mass production of Model T's not driver licenses that gave citizens freedom. The reason getting a pilot license requires aircraft rental is because access to aircraft is restricted to the point that few people have a family member with an aircraft that can be borrowed.
  - FabHK 9y ago
    Brudgers may be overstating the point, but there are some truths to it: 1. Annual aircraft sales are absolutely tiny. Only about 1000 piston engine airplanes are sold annually globally [1]. 2. Thanks to very small production numbers and demanding certification requirements, almost anything is super expensive in aviation. For example, to add air conditioning to your Diamond DA 40 will cost you 27,500 USD. An aviation headset will cost you 400 to 1000 USD. And so on. So, while I don’t believe that there’s a conspiracy to keep airplane numbers down, the fact remains that very few small aircraft are out there (and outside the USA it looks even grimmer), and only a small fraction of what was produced in the 60s is produced now. [1] https://gama.aero/news-and-events/press-releases/gama-presents-2017-year-end-aircraft-shipment-and-billings-numbers-at-annual-press-conference/ https://gama.aero/news-and-events/press-releases/gama-presen...
    - oldcynic 9y ago
      It's super expensive because the certification is spread across such low numbers. I wouldn't want to reduce certification or remove requirements for dual ignition and suchlike. Sales are tiny because the current fleet is enough, fewer are learning to fly each year, yet it's not much different in real terms today to fly than it was in the 60s. Fewer are walking into a flying club than used to, but many fewer are completing their 40hrs and PPL than used to. Why? That can't be down to sales or parts certification. My guess? Instant gratification combined with no longer being the postwar generation that had a perception of flying as being the arrival of the future. Flying is now a bit "meh" and being stuck in cattle class. Personally I don't understand how a trial lesson isn't enough to hook them for life! Just like back in the 60s it was "the friendly atom", whereas today nuclear power has rather lost its sheen.
    - brudgers 9y ago
      I think the regulations largely stem from domestic security/military policy that views aircraft as potential armaments. Whether that constitutes a conspiracy theory or not is left as an exercise for the reader. [1] What I find interesting about FAA regulations beyond the common idea that their effects are an obvious inevitability is that FAA regulations suggest how a world without the right to repair might look. In particular how the inhibition of the user's right to repair may play out in regard to self driving cars.
oldcynic 9y ago
> Safety is primarily achieved by limiting access and hence use. lol. No, safety is achieved by having strong licencing, both for pilots and aircraft, maintenance requirements, such as engine checks every x hours and so forth, and investigation into accidents. Any of the general citizenry can sign up to get a PPL, and in the US it is quite cheap and easy to do so. Long may it remain so. Even so, GA is considered dangerous, and can have impact on your ability to get life insurance. The main cause of GA deaths is pilot error. You can get easier access and lighter touch regulations simply by going for a plane in the light sport category. That has an even poorer safety record than GA.
- brudgers 9y ago
  The 'light sport' category exactly supports the analogy to sports cars. Two seats and an impractical cargo capacity. The limiting factor for citizen access to the sky is aircraft availability not pilot licensure. A Cessna 172's engine is slightly more sophisticated than an air-cooled VW's but the same basic 1930's technology. A new one starts at $70,000 because there is only a single source. There is only a single source because FAA regulations create a moat. Again, there are only 210,000 non-carrier aircraft in the US, the sky is only accessible to a fraction of the one percent by regulatory intent.
  - freeone3000 9y ago
    $70,000 is also the price of a Lexus or Infiniti or other entry-level luxury car. When you're on the highway surrounded by BMWs and Mercedes E-classes, that's the sort of people who, if flying was something they wanted to do, could have purchased an airplane instead, by your very own metric. In fact, let's extend this a bit further. You say a Cessna is in a moat because it's the only supplier.... of Cessnas. BMW is the only supplier of BMWs! That's ridiculous reasoning. There are other GA and even light sport aircraft available - Piper and FlightDesign and Zenith and Bristell all sell aircraft. And they're all in the same price range, leading one to believe that maybe aircraft manufacture isn't as cheap as you're making it out to be.
    - brudgers 9y ago